chris955

While living Brisbane we had a 'friend' immigrate, he was someone we met via an online forum much like this but motorbike related. The first time we actually met was at a BBQ at our place, he spent practically the whole time telling us all the things he could now do that were impossible in the UK. Odd as many of the things that were apparently impossible in the UK we had done many times.
It appears to be just part of the coping mechanism. How often do you hear about how it is practically impossible to actually drive anywhere here because of the bumper to bumper traffic or that there is litter everywhere or the people are miserable? Believing these things make it easier for some (many) to cope with what they have done. Another good one is houses here are so small and of course the old stand by that it rains everyday, sometimes twice a day.

Bud the Wiser

Probably true. Running down the place where you emigrated from and running down the place you returned or are returning from, seems quite a common way to justify ones decision.

TheEmperorIsNaked

Touché !!

chris955

For those needing to justify their decision you are no doubt correct.

TheEmperorIsNaked

This beat will go on.
It pivots on the perception of both countries, and nothing else.

UK: Bad weather/unemployment/crime/graffiti/overrun with migrants/so much dog poo that now it grows on trees...

Australia: Good weather/laid back lifestyle/large homes/no GFC hit/sandy beaches-surf.

Given those two perceptions-no matter how they occurred (and that one is easy!), it becomes habit to further disparage the UK.

But given the perception of Australia, it is literally unfathomable for so very many here and in the UK, how anyone could disparage such a paradise.

The UK with that perception is justifiably criticised isn't it?
With that profile of Australia-it's totally unjustified isn't it?

This entire ongoing argument/discussion pivots on that alone.

Someone elsewhere here asked why people would come/stay to/in Aus in the first place if they disliked it so much?
It's a fair question.

The flip side of it of course, is that if the UK is so horrible,-why are increasing numbers of people returning to that 'hellhole'?
Some of course will bounce back; many will stay-and inconceivably? actually be happy.

As that Professor fella used to say: "why is it so?"

chris955

Without wanting to sound like a stalking sycophant what a brilliant post. You sum this stuff up so well. What I have noticed is the habit of some to have fingers in their ears I cant hear you style if you point out something about their new future home. I know some will say I do that about this country but if you knew me you would know I am fully aware of its shortcomings but for us there arent very many.

Zen10

I feel at home in both countries, but when I was in the UK recently there was no mistaking that that was "really" home, but I'm not sure if that was just because of family or it went deeper.

Zen10

Yes, all these rows are definitely about justification. Did I do the right thing? If I can make others believe it then I might believe it myself, etc.

Zen10

OP -

I like your parent/child analogy, but I disagree about levels of welcome. I think Australia has become pretty bloody expert at welcoming incomers and did so with us in a very friendly, reassuring and understated way. I have never been made to feel "foreign" here at all. I'm Australian now, and proudly so.

chris955

For some, yes.

aries

I felt welcomed when I emigrated to Australia in 1960, and although there was the usual banter of me being a Pom, it was friendly.

Over the years I've lived back here and in Germany for up to a year at a time, but I was surprised that coming back for good I am constantly asked why I would bother.

They could be right, my expat time away amounted to 51 years, perhaps more than most members of BE, Australia being as much home to me as Britain which in many respects now feel like an alien society.

But is there any real evidence that more expats are returning, except perhaps from Spain? Clearly reading many posts on BE I can see there is an excitement about returning, however we should also take into account that many more expats are happy to stay in their adopted countries and don't use BE to air their feeling.

This article is interesting http://www.shelteroffshore.com/index...urn-home-11201

TheEmperorIsNaked

Yes there is. Honestly I would never put anything up that I couldn't prove (that's the lawyer thing I suppose!), but I've said before that I hate to put up links 'because they only support the point of view the putter upper wants to show', and besides:- statistics....?

I have/had? the graph thingy, I'll try and find it. It shows a steady increase of returnees each year.

I am also aware that expat forums have generally a 'returning to the UK' section, and obviously people who are returning-and want to talk about it, come on and post. But many do not, they just return, (maybe even come back, but they return).

What is noticeable to me though is that such posts are increasing. Personally, I would like every person returning to come on an expat forum and say why.
I would like to see people tell others what possible reason they could have for returning to such a dismal place...

For many of you Aus was either OK or even much enjoyed, but you (meant generally OK?) just prefer to be in the UK.
Some ARE avoiding criticism by putting that up as some sort of disclaimer. However, I really do believe the majority mean what they say.

I don't like it here. I have not liked it here for well over 30 years. But being a resident, to go any further with that is just ungracious and rude.
Lets be honest; people like me are hardly an asset here are we? The appropriate thing is just to bugger off isn't it?

(There's a real opener for a free kick right there!)

aries

No kicks or put downs, we all have our different ways of looking at things.

However, I would agree that if you are not happy where you are, leaving might be the answer. Or are you too deeply entrenched to do this and don't wish to sacrifice everything you have for the unknown? Many people suffer regrets whatever they do.

If you have the right outlook I am sure you will be welcomed back.

TheEmperorIsNaked

No no Aries (same as me!), I am flying out in November. Family constraints kept me here, but they are no longer relevant.

I'm also advised medically to go to a cooler climate. I had a DVT last year which travelled upward and I ended up with multiple blood clots in both lungs. They gave me THE talk about resusc. I said no; no one bashes on MY chest, thank-you very much!

It was not air travel (I've been slugged heavily on insurance for the November flight ), nor hereditary. Then they found two cells that had behaved very strangely and aligned,- and in simple terms had curdled my blood!

It is a bodily incapacity to process extreme heat, my body core can go 'off the scale'. So? if there's another heatwave in the UK-I have to say inside! But cooler temperatures have now become vital to longevity!

Combine those two things-snowball/hell I'll return.

TheEmperorIsNaked

Come now! The White Australia Policy alone shows that to be untrue.

Indigenous Australians largely-largely, live separately. Because they choose to? Could be, but it is a situation that so many White Australians prefer! (In this case WE were the 'incomers'. We didn't get a warm welcome either.....but we soon fixed that didn't we?)
Assimilation in Aus has been criticised by human rights organisations for years.

How welcome did we make the Chinese feel? How welcome did we make the Vietnamese boat people feel?
No point in referring to the last category is there?

(My local Murdoch rag recently printed a very small news snip on page 27/ right hand page/bottom/squeezed up against the spine of the rag.
We take 0.003 of the globes refugees. Referred to as 'a trickle').

I was turned down in '77. I know why. But it was overturned within days-I know why there, too!

Just correcting your error: what you meant was 'the right kind of incomers'.